Augustus Hanson: Abolitionist Diplomacy and Pan-African Liberation
The Reverend Augustus Hanson was an Underground Railroad conductor, abolitionist, missionary, scholar and one of the first European diplomats of African descent. With a career spanning West Africa, the United States and Great Britain, Hanson was an early theorist of what sociologist Paul Gilroy would call the Black Atlantic. Yet he is largely absent from both academic history and popular memory. Joseph Yannielli asks what we can learn by recovering the life, travels and broader transatlantic context of this pivotal figure.

The Authentic and Enchanting Sound of the Pan Pipes: Colonial Representation of Andean Music in the UK
Simón Palominos Mandiola delves into the narratives surrounding Andean music within the British music industry in the latter third of the 20th century. Drawing upon an examination of the musical works of Chilean-British musician Mauricio Venegas-Astorga, available at the Library, he explores how the confluence of authoritarianism, exile, imperial nostalgia and the exoticisation of world music contribute to a colonised representation of Andean music in the United Kingdom.

Joseph Yannielli is a lecturer in History at Aston University. Prior to this, he was a postdoctoral associate at the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition at Yale University. He is currently completing a book about the Mendi Mission established by American abolitionists in the wake of the Amistad rebellion. He is also interested in digital history and has co-created several public projects involving students, academics and community partners.

Simón Palominos Mandiola is a Chilean sociologist and musicologist. His primary research interests include popular music, migration and cultural policies. He is currently conducting doctoral research at the University of Bristol and exploring the narratives, representations and performances surrounding the music of migrant communities in Chile.